I haven't kept an online journal in a long time -- not since sophomore year of high school, to be exact -- but somehow it feels refreshing to get everything I'm thinking right now down on..."paper" again.

You know that scene from Kill Bill Vol. 2 where Beatrix is fighting her way out of the coffin she's been buried alive inside? I just realized what a great metaphor that is for the way I've been feeling lately. I feel like I'm empty of any purpose in my life and I have nothing to work on or look forward to besides a paycheck. And, being a Christian woman, I even wonder if God has taken all the things that once gave me happiness away from me as a way of showing me only He can make me happy...something akin to the story of Job, only I'm far less devout and faithful to my God than Job was. And in that sense, if this is indeed His way of telling me something, I have no right to ask Him why He's done this to me -- I deserved it, and to be honest I deserved much more.

But back to the coffin metaphor; I'm rambling: it feels like I've built my own version of Beatrix's coffin around myself, and now I'm finally deciding that I'm going to try to break out. My typical reaction to such a situation would be to just give up and accept that it's all over, to make peace with the way things are -- but not this time. I don't want to keep living this way, if living this can be called.

So I've decided I'm going to try to start writing again -- but this time I'm only writing original works. Fanfiction, while it used to be practically all I ever did, seems absurd to me now, and I don't want to be creatively restricted by another person's characters and then accused of making them OOC. Besides, after 9 years of rolepaying I have over 100 characters to choose from for a good original story.

My course of action is as follows: I must begin reading on a regular basis again in order to redevelop my writing style. Roleplay writing has made me lazy, and I must break out of the horrid cycle that it caused. Step two will be to assemble my cast of characters -- which, as I previously stated, won't take too much effort as I've been creating and developing characters for years. Once I've chosen my players, I will need to think up my general plot. In the past I got into the habit of ganking plots from my favorite books or movies and changing them just enough so it wouldn't be the exact same thing. I hated doing it then and I won't do it now...but the problem that caused that habit in the first place still remains: I have no inspiration. I'm hoping reading will bring it back to me, but inspiration is and always was a very fickle thing that would come and go as it pleased. In the past I would get an overwhelming urge that would practically force me to write, like many writers do, until I'd poured my heart out onto the page. If I failed to do that, the urge wouldn't leave me alone until I did...or it would just leave entirely and I'd miss my chance. I haven't felt that urge since I was 16 years old...but maybe I can coax it into returning to me. Music always helped with that.

But anyway...my thoughts are starting to run together now and I'm sure I've lost any reader's interest at this point. I guess I'll go watch a few Miyazaki movies and enjoy the rest of my day off. Good for the soul, that Miyazaki. ^^